The beginning of what could be a top-notch technothriller saga—entertaining and as thought-provoking as it is disturbingly...
The first installment in Michaels’ Aegis saga explores issues ripped from the headlines in a page-turner of a technothriller.
Alex Mercer’s childhood has been far from idyllic. Orphaned as a child in southeastern Europe and eventually landing in the U.S., she endured a horrific foster family experience before ending up with a couple living in the San Francisco Bay area, who’d recently emigrated from South Korea. Now 18 and a freshman in computer engineering at the University of Michigan, the hacker prodigy finds herself in a potentially deadly situation. Not only is she being blackmailed by a corrupt mayoral candidate who wants her to manipulate voting results, but a cyber terrorist, about to unleash a “digital plague” on the world, has her in his sights because of her online meddling. The cyber terrorist, nicknamed Cipher, obsesses over making America pay for their involvement in Bosnia decades earlier and the horrors they facilitated on the country’s populace, which included Cipher’s family. His ultimate goal is simple: “to see the world burn.” As Alex desperately tries to stop Cipher’s master plan before he kills her and those close to her, she begins to put together seemingly disparate puzzle pieces, some of which include an army of North Korean hackers, a top-secret branch of the U.S. Cyber Command, and jaw-dropping revelations about her biological parents.
There’s no question that Michaels delivers the goods to thriller fans. From the very first page, the pacing is pedal-to-the-metal, and the tension is palpable throughout. Alex’s paranoia bleeds through the pages: “Her attacker could be any of the people wandering the campus, searching for her. Ready to pull the trigger. Assuming they had a trigger. For all she knew, they’d dispatch her through more stealthy means like poison, or worse, a shiv wielded by a seemingly innocent passerby, the cold steel hidden beneath a benign smile.” But the real power here is Michaels’ character development. Alex’s complicated relationship with her foster parents and her revered Aunt Min—coupled with her own struggles to find herself and her place in the world—make her a three-dimensional, undeniably endearing hero. Additionally, there’s a subtle philosophical thread throughout, which gives the reading experience a profundity: “Hate exists not as a permanent scar upon the heart, but as a challenge, a call to action for each of us. It is an invitation to embark on the most noble of journeys: To reach out with an open heart, to listen with a compassionate ear, and to build, with the bricks of our shared humanity, a world where love triumphs over hate, understanding overcomes fear, and unity replaces division. This is the path to a brighter, kinder future—a world not of hate, but of hope.” Lastly, the author savvily leaves Alex, and other supporting characters, at a natural jumping-off point. Future installments could go in countless directions and be set anywhere in the world. The one minor criticism is that some plot twists are a bit predictable, especially for those who read a lot of thrillers. The beginning of what could be a top-notch technothriller saga—entertaining and as thought-provoking as it is disturbingly believable.Pub Date: May 14, 2025
ISBN: 9781958800171
Page Count: 420
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: March 4, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Maybe not the most thrilling thriller, but the role of AI in coping with grief gives this novel pathos and interest.
A widowed and disgraced plastic surgeon is drawn into a Russian oligarch’s evil schemes.
Witherspoon’s adult fiction debut, co-authored with thrillermeister Coben, opens as heart surgery performed by Dr. Marc Adams in a North African refugee camp is interrupted by the explosive invasion of armed militants. It's the last we will see of Marc in this dimension. The next chapter jumps ahead one year to a ceremony at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore where his widow, Maggie McCabe, is supposed to be presenting an award in honor of her mother. Miserable and anxious about appearing in public after having lost her medical license, she consults with her late husband on her phone—not via supernatural means, but using a "griefbot," an amazingly lifelike and functional AI app created by her genius sister, Sharon. Once the griefbot coaxes her to brave the sneering masses, she learns she’s been replaced on the podium anyway. But she runs into a former professor, a celebrity plastic surgeon, who requests a meeting with her at his office in New York and won’t take no for an answer. Next thing she knows, there’s $10 million in her bank account and she’s on a private plane heading to a palace outside Moscow where she’s been engaged to perform off-the-record surgery on billionaire Oleg Ragoravich (new face) and his girlfriend, Nadia (new boobs). And…we’re off. A whirl of surgeries, chases, and escapes ensues as Maggie gradually comes to understand who these people are and what they have in mind for her, and how it connects to Marc and their missing friend and business partner, Trace Packer. She is aided by her delightful father-in-law, Porkchop, owner of a biker bar in New York City and a very handy guy to have on your team if you've run afoul of an international criminal organization. From the palace in Rublevka the action moves to Dubai and then Bordeaux, climaxing in a high-stakes illegal heart transplant. But wait—is Marc really dead? What happened to Trace? Who is Nadia really? Though these smoldering questions don’t quite catch fire, it's a good first try for Witherspoon.
Maybe not the most thrilling thriller, but the role of AI in coping with grief gives this novel pathos and interest.Pub Date: Oct. 14, 2025
ISBN: 9781538774700
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: Oct. 15, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2025
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
Fast-moving and disturbingly plausible.
Robots may be the future of warfare in this final father-son DeMille collaboration.
In Camp Hayden, Army Maj. Roger Ames is found dead, his skull crushed. Chief Warrant Officers Scott Brodie and Maggie Taylor, special agents of the United States Army Criminal Investigation Division, are sent to the Mojave Desert, “a.k.a. in the middle of nowhere,” to investigate. In this fictional military installation, Army Rangers conduct field training exercises with lethal autonomous weapons. These “dangerous new toys,” nicknamed “tin men,” may become the future of warfare if they can be programmed to distinguish between friend and foe. Anyway, the Rangers’ job is to train the tin men, not the other way around. They are AI-driven robotic prototypes called D-17s, but even prototypes can kill. Did a bot kill the major? And was there criminal liability or intent, or was it a tragic accident? Brodie and Taylor discover that not everyone loves these beasts, and they must find out if humans are programming them for mischief or even trying to set up the program for failure. Meanwhile, the bots have nicknames. Bot number 20 is Bucky, seen on a video as a “seven-foot-tall titanium machine with hands covered in blood and brain matter” that has “a face but no eyes, with hands but no skin, with a body but no soul.” As scary as these beasties are, Brodie and Taylor must also look at the humans at Camp Hayden, because they learn that the “machines don’t have motives….They have inputs and outputs,” which naturally come from human programmers. They have neither brains nor courage nor honor; they do have brute force, speed, and agility. Obviously, plenty goes haywire in this enjoyable yarn. It feels a bit too believable for comfort, and that’s to the DeMilles’ credit as storytellers. Nelson DeMille had begun this project with his son Alex, who had to finish it alone after his father’s death.
Fast-moving and disturbingly plausible.Pub Date: Oct. 28, 2025
ISBN: 9781501101878
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: July 19, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2025
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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